These scamers have been operating for awhile now. They are a tucows client, this mean they have bought the contact list for the .biz domains or have broken their license agreement. Since I have received spam from them for .biz domains registered at different registrars, I'm guessing they have mined the whois data illegally.

I doubt tucows could do much even if they wanted to.

~jb

Robert L Mathews wrote:

We've seen another renewal scam being sent to our customers in the last couple of days. It's targeted at .biz owners, sent via spam e-mail to the WHOIS contact.

Here's a sample:



Dear Registrant,

Your domain EXAMPLE.BIZ is due for renewal shortly. If you wish to
renew your domain name please see our web site:

http://www.domain-renewal.biz

IMPORTANT: FAILURE TO RENEW YOUR DOMAIN BEFORE ITS EXPIRY DATE
WILL RESULT IN LOSS OF SERVICE.

Registration Fees:

2 Years - $30/year
3-5 Years - $22/year
6-10 Years - $19/Year

All costs are US Dollars. Should you have any questions on renewing
your domain please fill out our online contact form.

.BIZ Renewal
http://www.domain-renewal.biz

----------------------------------
If you no longer wish to receive domain renewal notifications
via email see http://www.domain-renewal.biz/notifications.htm
This email was sent to [EMAIL PROTECTED]



There's no mention in the e-mail, or on the site, that "renewing" your domain name with them is actually a transfer.


People who "renew" with them might get a few surprises. For example, they don't even have a control panel that you can use to update the nameservers... this feature is "coming soon"(!). They're also using servers hosted in China in an attempt to avoid anti-spam restrictions, and they don't accept support requests by phone.

By the way, domain-renewal.biz is registered through TUCOWS; I don't know if they're a TUCOWS reseller or not. Perhaps compliance can do something about this...?






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